Cely’s House Creative Workshops
Meet Cely Chicurel !
Cely is a native of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and part of a very artistic family. Her parents, Joel and Eleanor Carter, encouraged her early on to pursue a career in teaching and the arts. She spent many hours in the family kitchen working with clay and, before too long, was showing her wares at Carolina Friends School and Apple Chill art fairs.
Her formal education includes art and design at Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Cely holds a Bachelor of Science degree from East Tennessee State University with a major in pottery and weaving. She has completed further study at Penland and Arrowmont schools of arts and crafts.
As a Girl Scout leader, YMCA and Christian Service art camp director, Cely has had much experience in teaching and working with children and adults of all ages. She has held her own Summer Arts Experience Day Camps for over 25 years, creating a large following of students and parents, many of whom she helped and encouraged along artistic paths. Studio birthday parties and adult pottery workshops joined the ranks of events designed to fill any request.
Cely’s love of nature and the created world is joined with an interest in using the
imagination to create fun, new worlds. For more than 30 years, she has made
and sold pottery creations, castles, and fantasy creations. Although production pottery
is no longer part of her activities, Cely still has a passion for teaching and sharing her love of pottery and the arts
as a means of self-expression.
In 2001, Cely received a Master of Christian Ministry degree from Duke Divinity School and has added a new
dimension of art and spiritual retreat to her growing list of offerings.
For 10 years, Cely & Bill offered an art-centered afterschool in their home. The afterschool closed
in 2012, but Cely continues to teach pottery and other art classes after school from 3:30-5:30,
Monday - Friday. Cely has open studio time for adults several mornings each week.
In addition to pottery and sewing classes, painting classes are offered by Beatrice Ruggri
on Wednesday afternoons. Most Friday nights the studio is open for parents to come
with their children to have fun together making art.
